Artist Katrina Brees founded the July 4th Flotilla, a waterborne patriotic parade, in 2012. But she said her heart is just not in it this year. Brees, who customarily leads a ceremonial procession around the edge of Bayou St. John wearing an American-flag motif dress and carrying a triumphant sword, said that the symbolism seems off-base since the election of President Donald Trump.

"When I think about wearing my flag dress and waving flags; I don't know what it means this year," she said. "There are a lot of questions about our government."

From the start, the Flotilla was an arty, alternative event, but Brees said it was never intended as satire. Brees said that she views creativity as an American characteristic to be celebrated. Though she considered comic themes, such as a "billionaires parade" this year, the concept left her cold. She said that the Trump-targeted lampooning she saw in Mardi Gras parades this year didn't brighten her spirits.

"Even the humor, it just kind of upset me," she said. "It wasn't funny anymore. As soon as the election happened, I was thinking about the (July 4th) parade and I'm not sure how bohemia fits into patriotism anymore."

Watch the weirdly patriotic 4th of July Flotilla 2016 in New Orleans

Brees, who leads the Krewe of Kolossos bicycle float marching group and The Bearded Oysters marching group during Mardi Gras season, said she'll miss the summertime parade, even though it's been tough to produce each year.

Some area residents welcomed the annual event, Brees said, opening their homes to participants. But the size of the gathering and the litter some partiers left behind in the genteel Bayou St. John neighborhood irritated others.

In a Facebook post before the 2016 parade, Brees wrote: "Please be kind to the neighbors and respectful of the environment. Be an example of beautiful Americans celebrating our Nation's Independence Day. Respect our freedom to enjoy a day of friends on the Bayou: keep it classy and we will be able to continue this sacred tradition for years to come."

Though most participants abided by her request, the ever-expanding party was beyond her control, with some trash, costume remnants, spent fireworks and even boats left behind after the event. Testy complains came in by phone, holding her responsible, Brees said.

The anti-litter criticism aimed at Brees may be somewhat ironic since the artist is an advocate for removing what she views as toxic plastic beads and other non-recyclable throws from Mardi Gras.

Brees said that she's not pleased the patriotic party is over, but she admits she's somewhat relieved. She said that in New Orleans, once something is a success, we are compelled to perpetuate it. But, she asked rhetorically, "did I want to do this every 4th of July for the rest of my life?"

Brees said she would not be opposed if someone wanted to pick up the torch and carry on the Independence Day event. As a parade organizer, she said, "the greatest trophy would be a parade that continues without you."

“What rap did that was impressive was to show there are so many tone-deaf people out there,” he says. “All they need is a drum beat and somebody yelling over it and they’re happy. There’s an enormous market for people who can’t tell one note from another.” - Keef

" American student released from North Korea prison is reportedly in a coma "

" Rex Tillerson says Otto Warmbier, University of Virginia student serving a 15-year prison term, was released but did not mention his medical condition

US secretary of state Rex Tillerson said on Tuesday that North Korea had released Otto Warmbier, an American serving a 15-year prison term with hard labor for alleged anti-state acts, as reports emerged that the 22-year-old has been in a coma for as long as a year.

Tillerson said that Warmbier was on his way back to the US to be reunited with his family. He said in a statement that the state department secured Warmbier’s release at the direction of Donald Trump, adding that the department was continuing to discuss three other detained Americans with North Korea.

State department spokesperson Heather Nauert said in an afternoon press conference that she could make no comment on a report from the Washington Post that Warmbier had been in a coma since March of 2016.

Warmbier’s family told the Post that, according to North Korean officials, the 22-year-old contracted a case of botulism shortly after his trial and was given a sleeping pill from which he never woke up. Warmbier’s parents said they only learned of their son’s condition last week when the return was negotiated.

“Our son is coming home,” Fred Warmbier told the Post on Tuesday morning after Otto Warmbier was evacuated. “At the moment, we’re just treating this like he’s been in an accident. We get to see our son Otto tonight.”

In a statement to media, Fred and his wife Cindy added: “We want the world to know how we and our son have been brutalized and terrorized by the pariah regime in North [Korea]. We are so grateful that he will finally be with people who love him.”

Virginia senator Tim Caine called Warmbier’s release “long overdue” and said he was “relieved that he will soon be back home in the United States”.

“The North Korean regime should be condemned for Otto’s unjust imprisonment,” he continued.

Warmbier is being medically evacuated through the US military base in Sapporo, Japan.

A University of Virginia student from suburban Cincinnati, Warmbier was accused of trying to steal a propaganda banner from his hotel while visiting the country as a tourist in December of 2015. He was sentenced to 15 years of hard labor in March 2016 after a tearful televised public confession to the crime. It was widely suspected that the statement was written by North Korean officials and that Warmbier was coerced into delivering it.

At the time, state media said Warmbier’s crime was committed with “the tacit connivance of the US government and under its manipulation”.

The court decided that Warbier had committed his crime “pursuant to the US government’s hostile policy toward [North Korea] in a bid to impair the unity of its people after entering it as a tourist”. Pyongyang regularly accuses the US of sending operatives to North Korea for the purpose of overthrowing the hostile regime.

Tensions have only ratcheted up since Trump became president, with the commander-in-chief warning of a potential “major, major conflict” with the nuclear-armed totalitarian nation. A series of mostly unsuccessful missile tests by North Korea in April and May were met with corresponding moves by the US military, dispatching an aircraft carrier towards the region.

North Korean official Choe Ryong called the deployment a war-like provocation in April and said “we will respond to an all-out war with an all-out war and a nuclear war with our style of nuclear attack”.

The situation has defused somewhat in recent weeks.

Warmbier is the first release of a US prisoner since Kenneth Bae and Matthew Miller were let out in November 2014 after receiving similar sentences for committing ostensibly minor crimes in the country.

Another American, Sandra Suh, was deported by the regime in 2015 for producing “anti-Pyongyang propaganda”, but was not detained for any length of time.

The announcement happens to coincide with former NBA player Dennis Rodman’s third visit to North Korea, but Nauert said Tuesday that the release and Rodman’s travels were in no way related.

The colorful and controversial Rodman said his goal was to “open the door” to the rogue nation and to see his “friend”, dictator Kim Jong-Un. His outing appeared to be sponsored by marijuana industry affiliated e-currency PotCoin. "

What Britain needs is another Margaret Thatcher. She may not be everyone's favourite but, she had the courage of conviction, and she would be a strong ally to Trump, as she was to Regan. There is a growing move in the west towards, protection of one's national security, the consequences of which maybe too frightening to fully contemplate.But steps have to be taken to end this carnage being inflicted by these radicalised individuals, and groups.I do not know how, because my solution would be viewed of course as archaic, racisist and, insular.But this is what our (so called political representatives) are there for, are they not? To sit down and work out what to really do in these situations.These atrocities will continue because OIL, and cheap labour are the priorities. Is this not a form of APPESMENT? Close those mosques (known to the intelligence community) as being the breeding ground of would be terrorists DOWN.Send those on terror lists back to their countries of ethnic origin, even if, they born in the countries they wish to inflict their hideous operations on. Throughout the west a growing swing(sometimes to the far right) is happening. People in the west need to understand WE ARE AT WAR.

World War Three wont be what people expect. It is, a war of terror, and it has begun.Even if ISIL/ISIS could be eradicated, another bunch of warmongering lunatics would take their place. Close the borders. Deport the suspected radicals, and jail, yes, jail the hate spreading Mullahs for their evil rhetoric.Trump is yet to prove his willingness toward American protection but he deserves the time to reach some sort of solution. Sadly, I don't see a solution in the UK is possible.And well, as for Australia, it's got it's head in the sand as usual. Too concerned with selling outdated fossil fuels to China, (oh! The country that is), as well as it's hypocritical selling of yellow cake uranium abroad. But; Australia is a nuclear free country????I dearly hope some solution can be found to this terror problem, and maybe the likes of Trump, and Corbyn are the solution we so desperately need.

One awfull day, they will use some sort of nuclear device, I think maybe they already( have, not just one, but many.) Simply waiting for the right opportunity, and time, to use it/them.People who simply will not understand that like it or not; Trump is your elected leader. To those people who keep whining about the American electoral system; It has been in place since day one, never before has an elected leader faced such opposition to his presidency.The people voted, Trump won, he's your leader, deal with it!

" The prime minister thinks government is the solution, not the problem. "

By Rosemary Righter

" Unflashy, camera-shy, socially awkward and a hit with British voters—at least, the English and Welsh variety— Theresa May is leading her Conservative troops into battle as the self-proclaimed champion of “ordinary working people” ahead of June’s general election.

Coming from almost any other Tory, this might have been a cheeky joke at the clique of half-baked revolutionaries in Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn’s camp. But Mrs. May doesn’t “do” jokes. If she wins the sweeping Conservative victory she seeks, Britons will have given their mandate to an unabashed interventionist, passionately convinced of “the good that government can do” and the duty of the state to mend society’s ills, curb capitalism’s excesses and stand as a bulwark against the unsettling forces of globalization.

Welcome back—just possibly—to the pre-Thatcher Britain I grew up in, the land that coined the word “Butskellism.” A conflation of the surnames of the Tory Party’s Rab Butler and Labour leader Hugh Gaitskell, Butskellism was shorthand for a left-leaning, corporatist postwar mind-set in both main parties. Fear of change—and, in the Tory case, fear of an increasingly welfare-dependent electorate—kept much of the economy unprofitably in state hands for fear of committing the crime of “selling off the family silver,” and the whole country in thrall to over-mighty trade unions.

It trapped politicians into generally fruitless efforts to banish stagflation by controlling prices and wages, and to ward off economic decline with “industrial strategies” that mainly amounted to subsidizing flagging industries. These were decades sacrificed to a bungling corporatism, culminating in the late 1970s in near-bankruptcy. They should have taught us that the most untrustworthy of all political phenomena is “a safe pair of hands.”

Margaret Thatcher took risks; calculated risks, for the most part. Like the Greek goddess Pallas Athene, she took care to pick battles she could win, but she was no less a radical for that because at its core hers was a gamble that the British could be persuaded that the key to national recovery was to reward individual effort, encourage ambition and open up the marketplace to competition.

Mrs. May’s ambition to make Britain “a country that works for everyone” and promote social mobility isn’t that far off from Mrs. Thatcher’s pitch. Yet she has overtly positioned herself in the opposite ideological corner. For her, “markets are broken” and need “strong” government action to tackle “burning injustices” that blight the life chances of the children of poor families, to transform the prospects of the “just-about-managing” income bracket and at the top, to rein in corporate excess.

Some of her ideas, such as her flirtation with workers on company boards and the economically illiterate proposal to cap domestic energy bills, echo the socialist agenda of Ed Milliband, loser of the 2015 election, and put her well to the left of former Labour Prime Minister Tony Blair.

But is she really a left-wing statist in Tory twinsets? Or is she a conservative with a small “c,” who, like Prince Tancredi in Lampedusa’s novel “The Leopard,” believes that “for things to remain as they are, everything must change”? She argues forcefully that uneasiness about globalization, rising hostility to the mantras of liberal capitalism and resentment of widening income disparities among those “left behind” have reached such a pitch that the state must act as a protective counterpoint, intervening to right the social and economic balance in the name of what she repeatedly refers to as “the common good.” Then again, in terms of what it implies for expanding the role of the state, is this a distinction without a difference?

Mrs. May has a disconcerting propensity to micromanage every decision. The unintended consequence is that the big ideas in her speeches get stuck in the works long enough to be watered down. Consider the ill-conceived scheme to put workers on company boards, quietly replaced by proposed worker and consumer “advisory panels,” and the unpleasantly xenophobic idea, now dropped, that companies could be named-and-shamed into hiring British workers by forcing them to list their foreign employees. The government’s green paper on corporate reform reads more like an effort to bolster public trust in business than a declaration of war on private enterprise. Her vaunted “proper industrial strategy,” rather than laying out a grand interventionist framework, has dwindled into a rather incoherent laundry list of small-scale interventions.

For this relief, much thanks—as also for Mrs. May’s Brexit-driven pledge to make Britain “the strongest global advocate for free markets.” Her recent proposal to endow government with French-style powers to block foreign takeovers is likely to be checkmated by Britain’s pressing need to demonstrate that it is more than ever a country open to foreign investors. Her actions to date have been much more cautious than her speeches. With luck, Mrs. May will turn out to be interventionist by instinct, but liberal by default. But that “safe pair of hands” will need watching like a hawk. "

" Public Theater should cancel its Trump assassination play. But it won’t. "

By Daniel Henninger

" James T. Hodgkinson, who on Wednesday shot Republican Rep. Steve Scalise and four others, posted this on his Facebook page March 22: “Trump is a Traitor. Trump Has Destroyed Our Democracy. It’s Time to Destroy Trump & Co.”

Sitting in the dying light of World War I, the poet T.S. Eliot wrote, “I had not thought death had undone so many.” What’s our excuse? Displays of political or social excess seem to be everywhere. Whatever once fastened the doors of people’s minds to something secure and stable has become unhinged.

Some thought the apotheosis of political derangement had been reached when celebrity Kathy Griffin posted a video of herself holding the bloody, severed head of Donald Trump.

But that wasn’t the end of it. We may assume that as Ms. Griffin was creating her video, the artists at New York’s Public Theater were rehearsing their production of “ Julius Caesar, ” the one in which Central Park audiences watch Caesar as a blond-haired Donald Trump, who is pulled down from a podium by men in suits and assassinated with plunging knives.

The news site Axios runs stories regularly about journalists who have been suspended or fired because of their unhinged postings on Twitter . After Donald Trump used a tweet to revive his long-running feud with the mayor of London amid the June 3 killings, CNN personality Reza Aslan tweeted that Mr. Trump was a “piece of s—.”

Some take comfort that these displays did not go unpunished. CNN wrist-slapped Ms. Griffin by dropping her as co-host of its New Year’s Eve show with Anderson Cooper. Delta Air Lines , American Express and Bank of America withdrew their sponsorship of “Julius Caesar,” though New York City’s Democratic Comptroller Scott Stringer said their pullout “sends the wrong message.”

Advertisers must wake up every morning wondering what political meteorite will hit them next. J.P. Morgan Chase pulled its ads this week from NBC News rather than be associated with Megyn Kelly’s prime-time interview with Alex Jones to discuss “controversies and conspiracies,” such as his notion that the Sandy Hook murders were a hoax. Ms. Kelly justified the interview in part on Twitter because Donald Trump appeared on Mr. Jones’s show and “our job is 2 shine a light.”

Donald Trump’s election has caused psychological unhingement in much of the population. But the Trump phenomenon only accelerated forces that were plummeting in this direction before the 2016 election.

Social media—a permanent marinade for the human brain—is causing a vast, mysterious transformation of how people process experience, and maybe someday a future B.F. Skinner will explain what it has done to us.

Impossible to miss, though, is how jacked up emotional intensity has become in American politics. The campaign rallies of both Mr. Trump and Bernie Sanders often sat on the edge of violence. Reporters describe political town hall meetings as full of “angry” voters. Shouting down the opposition in these forums or on campus has been virtually internalized as standard behavior. Refusal to reason is the new normal. And then the unreason is euphemized as free speech.

Explaining away these impulses as a routine turn of the populist political cycle is insufficient. Something more permanent is happening.

I remain fascinated with the case of the 10 incoming Harvard freshmen who celebrated their achievement by posting a series of remarkably repulsive, violent photographic memes on Facebook. One said abusing children was sexually arousing; another described the hanging of a Mexican child as “piñata time.”

What those no-longer Harvard students had done was create a “private” Facebook messaging board, where they somehow felt free to mock and subvert current social convention. They aren’t alone. The website Reddit, which has about 500 million monthly visitors, became known for similar “anonymous” bulletin boards on which men, for example, exchange outrageous sexual postings.

We negotiate much of daily life now in tense, parallel universes: One is overflowing with individual political and social behavior that is deviant—flights from the norm—at a time when broader norms of political and social behavior are enforced with a vengeance. Today you can get shamed, sued or fired for almost any conceivable offense.

In reaction, millions of people—including the president—seem to regard social media as a kind of wildlife refuge, where they can run naked against society’s dammed-up personal and political opinions.

The possibilities for psychological dislocation are limitless. Kathy Griffin justified her beheaded-Trump stunt by arguing, “I’ve dealt with older white guys trying to keep me down my whole life. . . . This is a woman thing.”

We know that political anger and violence can become mystical in its attraction, especially at the margin for people like political shooter James Hodgkinson. This is a good moment to dial it back. The Public Theater’s management could cancel their staged Trump assassination in Central Park. But they won’t. Like so many others with political disorder syndrome, they no longer can. "

Cut it out! Cut it out! Cut it out! The hell's the matter with you? Stupid! We're all very different people. We're not Watusi. We're not Spartans. We're Americans, with a capital 'A', huh? You know what that means? Do ya? That means that our forefathers were kicked out of every decent country in the world. We are the wretched refuse. We're the underdog. We're mutts! Here's proof: his nose is cold! But there's no animal that's more faithful, that's more loyal, more loveable than the mutt. Who saw "Old Yeller?" Who cried when Old Yeller got shot at the end?

“What rap did that was impressive was to show there are so many tone-deaf people out there,” he says. “All they need is a drum beat and somebody yelling over it and they’re happy. There’s an enormous market for people who can’t tell one note from another.” - Keef

" Special counsels can run amok. One went after me once for the crime of forgetfulness. "

By Karl Rove

" While Jeff Sessions was testifying Tuesday on Capitol Hill, Sen. Ron Wyden suggested that the attorney general had recused himself from investigating Russian electoral meddling because of unknown, “problematic” reasons. “There are none—I can tell you that for absolute certainty,” Mr. Sessions shot back, dismissing the supercilious charge as “secret innuendo.”

Good for Mr. Sessions. But since Democrats seem intent on preparing the battlefield for the 2018 midterm elections, expect more such baseless charges. Never mind the damage they do to public trust.

Consider the accusation that President Trump obstructed justice in the FBI investigation of former national security adviser Mike Flynn. According to former FBI Director James Comey, the president told him: “I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go.”

“There’s no question he abused power,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said last week. Two Democratic backbenchers, Reps. Al Green of Texas and Brad Sherman of California, have even drafted articles of impeachment based on the charge.

But I talked to four legal experts—two former Justice Department officials, a former White House lawyer and a former U.S. attorney—who all agreed Mr. Trump has the rightful power, as head of the executive branch, to order the FBI to end any investigation.

One expert raised this thought experiment: If President John F. Kennedy had ordered FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover to stop investigating Martin Luther King Jr., would that have constituted obstruction of justice?

It’s also far from clear Mr. Trump ordered anything. His words were vague. A hope is not an order. The president said he wanted to get to the bottom of Russian election meddling. He added that he hoped Mr. Comey would discover whether any of Mr. Trump’s “satellites”—an apparent reference to people who worked in his presidential campaign—had done anything wrong. Both statements suggest Mr. Trump wanted the Russian investigation to go forward and believed it would clear his name.

The statute that describes obstruction of justice speaks of “corrupt” conduct. Yet there is no evidence Mr. Trump acted with criminal purpose—for example, that he was bribed to shut down the Flynn investigation, or that he was trying to hide some personal financial interest in Mr. Flynn’s foreign lobbying. No wonder Mr. Comey, when discussing the conversation at the time with other officials, didn’t claim obstruction.

Still, Mr. Trump has created a potential problem for himself. At a Friday press conference, ABC’s Jonathan Karl asked the president whether he would be “willing to speak under oath to give your version of those events.” Mr. Trump replied: “One hundred percent.”

The president had better hope that Robert Mueller, the special counsel now looking into potential Russia-Trump ties, is nothing like Patrick Fitzgerald, the special counsel appointed in 2003 to investigate the leaking of a CIA official’s name to the columnist Robert Novak.

Mr. Fitzgerald knew within days, if not hours, of his appointment that the leak had come from Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage but that it violated no law since the CIA employee was no longer a covert operative.

Despite no underlying crime, Mr. Fitzgerald spent more than three years obsessed with trying to justify his existence by prosecuting someone in the Bush White House for lying under oath. I was one of those in his sights.

He focused on me because, while I could not remember a brief call in 2003 from a Time reporter, I had ordered my staff the following year to search for any evidence I had talked to the journalist. That was supposed to be proof I had lied. Mr. Fitzpatrick gave up hunting me only when he learned that my lawyer had directed me to search my files after hearing from the reporter’s colleague that I had talked with him.

Instead Mr. Fitzpatrick indicted the vice president’s chief of staff, Lewis “Scooter” Libby, a very good man, on a disagreement over who said what, when and to whom.

Today, given what we know, Mr. Trump is not vulnerable on obstruction of justice. But if Mr. Mueller turns out to be another Mr. Fitzgerald and finds no underlying offense, he may decide that he must still get someone for something, even over inconsequential differences of memory.

Promising to speak under oath is dangerous for Mr. Trump, since any trial would be in Washington, D.C. There were no Republicans on Mr. Libby’s jury, and Mr. Trump received a mere 4% of the vote there. The president better pray Robert Mueller is more responsible than Patrick Fitzgerald.

Mr. Rove helped organize the political-action committee American Crossroads and is the author of “The Triumph of William McKinley ” (Simon & Schuster, 2015).

Instead Mr. Fitzpatrick indicted the vice president’s chief of staff, Lewis “Scooter” Libby, a very good man, on a disagreement over who said what, when and to whom.

Scoot Libby was a seditious traitor, Joe. Unless you are Israeli, then he's a patriot. He's a patron. A patron of Israelism. It's contextual.

Did you hear what they did to us in Australia, Joe? They mocked us. Mocked us like animals in a haymow. Mocked us like a fat neck on a skinny fish. Mocked us most unmerciful. This is what the Founding Fathers predicted in The Manifest Destiny. They predicted the mocking. We need to pull out of ANZUS. Our

Instead Mr. Fitzpatrick indicted the vice president’s chief of staff, Lewis “Scooter” Libby, a very good man, on a disagreement over who said what, when and to whom.

Scoot Libby was a seditious traitor, Joe. Unless you are Israeli, then he's a patriot. He's a patron. A patron of Israelism. It's contextual.

Did you hear what they did to us in Australia, Joe? They mocked us. Mocked us like animals in a haymow. Mocked us like a fat neck on a skinny fish. Mocked us most unmerciful. This is what the Founding Fathers predicted in The Manifest Destiny. They predicted the mocking. We need to pull out of ANZUS. Our

Instead Mr. Fitzpatrick indicted the vice president’s chief of staff, Lewis “Scooter” Libby, a very good man, on a disagreement over who said what, when and to whom.

Scoot Libby was a seditious traitor, Joe. Unless you are Israeli, then he's a patriot. He's a patron. A patron of Israelism. It's contextual.

Did you hear what they did to us in Australia, Joe? They mocked us. Mocked us like animals in a haymow. Mocked us like a fat neck on a skinny fish. Mocked us most unmerciful. This is what the Founding Fathers predicted in The Manifest Destiny. They predicted the mocking. We need to pull out of ANZUS. Our

Leader

was elected by the god-fearing people of Pittsburgh, not Perth!

Never go full faggotty assed sidekick.

Mock away, but be aware that Don Trump is the only one that stands against imposition of Sharialist law.

" That didn’t take long. Barely a week after James Comey admitted leaking a memo to tee up a special counsel against Donald Trump, multiple news reports based on leaks confirm that special counsel Robert Mueller is investigating the President for obstruction of justice. You don’t have to be a Trump partisan to have concerns about where all of this headed.

President Trump has reportedly stepped back this week from his temptation to fire Mr. Mueller, and that’s the right decision. The chief executive has the constitutional power to fire a special counsel through the chain of command at the Justice Department, but doing so would be a political debacle by suggesting he has something to hide.

Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who appointed Mr. Mueller, would surely resign, and other officials might resign as well until someone at Justice fulfilled Mr. Trump’s orders. The President’s opponents would think it’s Christmas. The dismissal would put the President’s political allies in a terrible spot and further distract from what are make-or-break months for his agenda on Capitol Hill. His tweets attacking the probe are also counterproductive, but by now we know he won’t stop.

***There are nonetheless good reasons to raise questions about Mr. Mueller’s investigation, and those concerns are growing as we learn more about his close ties to Mr. Comey, some of his previous behavior, and the people he has hired for his special counsel staff. The country needs a fair investigation of the facts, not a vendetta to take down Mr. Trump or vindicate the tribe of career prosecutors and FBI agents to which Messrs. Mueller and Comey belong.

Start with the fact that Mr. Comey told the Senate last week that he asked a buddy to leak his memo about Mr. Trump specifically “because I thought that might prompt the appointment of a special counsel.” Did Mr. Comey then suggest Mr. Mueller’s name to Mr. Rosenstein? He certainly praised Mr. Mueller to the skies at his Senate hearing.

The two former FBI directors are long-time friends who share a similar personal righteousness. Mr. Mueller, then running the FBI, joined Mr. Comey, then Deputy Attorney General, in threatening to resign in 2004 over George W. Bush’s antiterror wiretaps.

Less well known is how Mr. Mueller resisted direction from the White House in 2006 after he sent agents with a warrant to search then Democratic Rep. William Jefferson’s congressional office on a Saturday night without seeking legislative-branch permission. The unprecedented raid failed to distinguish between documents relevant to corruption and those that were part of legislative deliberation. GOP Speaker Dennis Hastert rightly objected to this as an executive violation of the separation of powers and took his concerns to Mr. Bush.

The President asked his chief of staff, Joshua Bolten, to ask Mr. Mueller to return the Jefferson documents that he could seek again through regular channels, but the FBI chief refused. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was also unable to move the FBI director. When Mr. Bolten asked again, Mr. Mueller said he wouldn’t tolerate political interference in a criminal probe, as if the Republican Mr. Bush was trying to protect a corrupt Democrat. Mr. Mueller threatened to resign, and the dispute was settled only after Mr. Bush ordered the seized documents sealed for 45 days until Congress and Mr. Mueller could work out a compromise.

The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals later ruled that the FBI raid had violated the Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause and Mr. Jefferson’s “non-disclosure privilege” as a Member of Congress, though the court let Justice keep the documents citing Supreme Court precedent on the exclusionary rule for collecting evidence.

We relate all this because it shows how Mr. Mueller let his prosecutorial willfulness interfere with proper constitutional and executive-branch procedure. This showed bad judgment. He shares this habit with Mr. Comey.

***Meanwhile, Mr. Mueller’s staff appointments suggest that he is preparing for a long prosecutorial campaign. One unusual choice is Michael Dreeben, a highly regarded Deputy Solicitor General whose expertise is criminal law and the Constitution. He is not a prosecutor or counter-intelligence expert. Is Mr. Dreeben on hand to make a legal case for impeachment?

The special counsel has also recruited Andrew Weissmann, who oversaw the Enron Task Force and led the prosecution of the Arthur Andersen accounting firm. The Supreme Court unanimously overturned Andersen’s conviction, though too late for Andersen’s 28,000 U.S. employees.

Mr. Weissmann has donated to Hillary Clinton’s political campaign, but more relevant for this case he was highly criticized for his legal conduct over the years by the New York Observer newspaper. “In Andrew Weissmann, The DOJ Makes a Stunningly Bad Choice for Crucial Role,” said one headline in January 2015. The owner of the Observer at the time? Jared Kushner, President Trump’s son in law and now a White House aide.

With that history, can Mr. Weissmann fairly judge the actions of the Trump family and campaign? And knowing that history, why would Mr. Mueller choose Mr. Weissmann for his prosecutorial team when the appearance of fairness is crucial to public acceptance of the result?

As it happens, the Washington Post reported in its second big story this week that Mr. Mueller “is investigating the finances and business dealings of Jared Kushner.” A fair question is whether Mr. Weissmann is another Patrick Fitzgerald who won’t stop until he nails someone in this probe.

***Mr. Mueller is widely admired and no one questions his personal integrity, but we raise these issues because the stakes for American democracy are so high. As we’ve said from the beginning, Russian meddling in U.S. elections is a serious matter and Americans need to know what happened. If Mr. Trump or key associates canoodled with the Russians to steal an election, then he must face the likely consequence of impeachment.

But the public has seen no such evidence, and the FBI has been looking for months. Instead we have leaks that the special counsel whose friend was fired by Donald Trump is focusing on obstruction of an investigation into an underlying crime that so far doesn’t exist. In Watergate at least there was a third-rate burglary.

Much of Washington clearly views Mr. Mueller as their agent to rid the country of a President they despise. Every political and social incentive in that city will press Mr. Mueller to oblige. But you cannot topple a duly elected President based merely on innuendo or partisan distaste without doing great harm to democracy.

Richard Nixon’s road to resignation was painful but the facts were clear enough at the end that most Americans accepted the result. The country deserves no less concerning Donald Trump, no matter his character flaws. Mr. Mueller and his team of zealous prosecutors have a duty to bring a case based only on solid and conclusive evidence. Otherwise close the case with dispatch and move on.

American politics is divisive and dysfunctional as it is. Imagine what it will be like if millions of Americans conclude that a presidential election is being overturned by an elite consensus across the vast ideological and cultural divide running all the way from the New York Times to the Washington Post. "

There are nonetheless good reasons to raise questions about Mr. Mueller’s investigation, and those concerns are growing as we learn more about his close ties to Mr. Comey, some of his previous behavior, and the people he has hired for his special counsel staff. The country needs a fair investigation of the facts, not a vendetta to take down Mr. Trump or vindicate the tribe of career prosecutors and FBI agents to which Messrs. Mueller and Comey belong."

They will do anything they can to tear down Our Leader and impose Sharialism on god-fearing, tax-paying, flag honoring, ground tilling Americans of heritage. Anything within their scurrilous bag of trickery to chisel Don Trump! And this at a time when Trump's approval amongst ethnical Negroes is higher than any president since Harry "Solomon" Truman. But you never see that reported in the goddam liberal media!

“What rap did that was impressive was to show there are so many tone-deaf people out there,” he says. “All they need is a drum beat and somebody yelling over it and they’re happy. There’s an enormous market for people who can’t tell one note from another.” - Keef

“What rap did that was impressive was to show there are so many tone-deaf people out there,” he says. “All they need is a drum beat and somebody yelling over it and they’re happy. There’s an enormous market for people who can’t tell one note from another.” - Keef